“Myself and the majority of children in the country are at one in what makes theatre fun.”

Birmingham Stage Company’s actor-manager is of course talking about Horrible Histories, its hit series of stage shows based on Terry Deary’s hilarious historical books crammed with gruesome and gory moments from Ancient Egypt to World War II.

The company brings its original productions of Terrible Tudors and Vile Victorians to the Empire next month.

It’s six years since Neal approached the Horrible Histories’ writer with a proposal to brings his stories to life on stage. But it was Terry Deary’s idea to turn it into a unique visual experience.

Neal explains: “He said he’d like the set to be like a video screen, which I was quite against because I’m not actually a fan of multi-media theatre.”

He changed his tune dramatically after a visit to Middlesborough-based Amazing Interactives which specialises in 3D, recalling: “When I saw it, it took about 20 seconds to say that IS Horrible Histories, that’s how I’d like to do it.”

Thus what Neal’s christened Bogglevision was born, the show mixing a company of actors performing sketches with a second half where the audience has to duck out of the way of Spanish Armada cannonballs or dodge the Tay Bridge collapsing.

Birmingham Stage Company celebrates its 20th anniversary this year and among its new productions is Barmy Britain, opening in the West End this month.

Neal co-wrote the show with Terry and is one of “two actors and a basket of props”. It is, he says, “a journey around Britain in an hour” from Romans and Vikings to World War I.

The Birmingham-born performer was fresh out of Bristol Old Vic Theatre School when he founded the theatre company in 1992, using Birmingham’s Old Rep theatre as a base.

“I was looking for a theatre all over the country and it just happened to be in Birmingham,” he says.

“It couldn’t have been luckier, that a Brummie started his theatre company in his home city because of course I got all the support – not from the establishment, but from the media and the public.”

Early on he also got support from some of the biggest names in the business too, persuading them to help him raise £15,000 to put on his first production by doing free ‘in conversation’ fundraisers.

Judi Dench, Peter O’Toole, Ian McKellen and Alan Bennett were among his supporters, while Dustin Hoffman said in 23-year-old Neal he recognised himself as a young actor.

Children’s theatre meanwhile has always been at the heart of what the company does, with its first Christmas show all those years ago being Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr Fox.

Neal says: “I think the big difference between our shows and so many other shows created for children is that I just love children, and I don’t regard them as second class citizens which so many other producers do.

“We put the same time and investment, and use the same amount of money and calibre of creative team, as we would for an adult show.

“And what’s a hallmark of our productions is that generally you can’t hear a sound from children, apart from when you’re scaring them or making them have a good time.”